The Best and the Brightest

David Halberstam’s masterpiece, the defining history of the making of the Vietnam tragedy, with a new Foreword by Senator John McCain.

Using portraits of America’s flawed policy makers and accounts of the forces that drove them, The Best and the Brightest reckons magnificently with the most important abiding question of our country’s recent history: Why did America become mired in Vietnam, and why did we lose? As the definitive single-volume answer to that question, this enthralling book has never been superseded. It is an American classic.

David Halberstam is the author of a number of books, including The Powers That Be, The Reckoning, Summer of '49, and Playing for Keeps. He lives in New York City. His new book, War in a Time of Peace, will be published in September, 2001.

Senator John McCain is the author of Faith of My Fathers. After a career in the United States Navy and two terms as United States Representative, he was elected to the Senate in 1986, 1992, and 1998. He and his wife, Cindy, reside in Phoenix.